Got to kick at the darkness 'til it bleeds daylight
by OtterAndTerrier
Summary: [COMPLETE] He can't leave the Empire, but stars, whenever they meet, he just can't go against her, this girl who lost everything, who actually believes in what she's fighting for, unlike him who doesn't know what to believe in, if he's ever believed in anything; this girl who grew up into this beautiful fire of a woman, and he thinks… he thinks he kinda likes her. - Imperial!Han AU


**A/N:** This is another fic I wrote for **Han/Leia Week** on Tumblr. One of the prompts was AU/Crossover, and I first considered doing a Social Media AU graphic or something like that. I'm very selective when reading AU fics and generally don't write them because I need context, which you can't get in a short story. But then I came up with this plot bunny and I thought I'd give it a shot! I tried my best fleshing out the AU and keeping Han and Leia as in character as possible within it, while stopping myself from writing a multi-chapter. Considering that it was out of my comfort zone, I quite like how this turned out ^-^

Hope you guys enjoy it!

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In all his wretch of a life, the only constant for Han Solo has been his love of flying, and the only commitment he's ever made, wherever it took him. That was how—by an extraordinary set of circumstances—he wound up graduating at the top of his class from the Academy and joining the Imperial Navy as a pilot.

It is during a visit to the royal palace of Alderaan when he meets Princess Leia Organa, the most royal pain in the ass he's ever suffered. Bail Organa was said to be an idealist, and still a staunch supporter of the Republic—rumoured, even, to have connections with rebel cells. His daughter, having followed his steps and joined the Senate, shared his delusions as well. The week he spends at the palace is the most riled up he's been in a very long time and, hot-headed as he is, that's saying something.

Fortunately for him, Her High-And-Mightiness avoids him as much as she can, but an argument between them never fails to break out whenever they are together in the same room.

'You're quite the mercenary, Captain Solo,' she shoots at him one day, her eyes sparking with hatred. 'I wonder if you really care about anything—or anybody.'

Her words strike a chord in him, but he isn't going to acknowledge that. It's a relief when he's finally able to take off.

They meet again under less prosperous conditions—for her, at least. She's been taken prisoner, suspected of being a rebel, and brought aboard the Death Star. Han is just passing by the battle station for repairs. He sees Alderaan's destruction and hopes she's secure in her cell, oblivious. Whatever else she is, regardless of the Emperor's reasons to eliminate the planet, Princess Leia is hardly more than a kid. When he finds the sandy-haired boy, the so-called Jedi and the Wookiee attempting a rescue, Han does what he believes is right. He lets them into the cell and lets her go. He's always had a soft spot for underdogs, after all.

Han would have never guessed that wasn't the last he'd ever see of the princess. He's never believed in fate, but he knows about luck, and how can he doubt it when they keep running into each other while she's on one of her suicide missions? Over and over, he finds himself letting her go. Cooperating, even, with a lot of complaining and threats, but still he does it, behind the Empire's back, aiding these freedom fighters that were fighting against _him_.

During one of these encounters, she asks him, 'Why don't you just join us? We could use pilots like you—men like you.'

He can't leave the Empire—there's too much at stake for him here—but stars, whenever they meet, he just can't go against her, this girl who lost everything, who actually believes in what she's fighting for, unlike him who doesn't know what to believe in, if he's ever believed in anything; this girl who grew up into this beautiful fire of a woman, and he thinks… he thinks he kinda likes her.

If there's one thing the Academy never managed to drill out of him, it's his inability to pass up a chance at seduction, and Leia's haughty flustering—which she covers with her usual scathing replies—makes it almost irresistible.

'Afraid I was gonna leave without giving you a goodbye kiss?' he says once, in a dingy hangar he managed to clear for one of her rebellion's ships.

'I'd just as soon kiss a Wookiee,' Leia snaps without batting an eyelid. He believes she would.

'You could use a good kiss!'

And she does, two years after the Death Star, as he smuggles her in a secret compartment of his private cabin, on his official Imperial Navy ship, from one backwater planet to another where she will rejoin the Alliance. He kisses her because fuck, this is the craziest, most suicidal thing he's ever done for her, and if he gets caught, Han knows she would get away—one way or another, she always does—but he'll be executed as a traitor. So what does he have to lose if he kisses her?

He thought the chances of her kissing him back were against him but luckily, he's never been one to mind the odds.

It's the start of—everything. Everything he's never thought he could have. Except, what _does_ he have? Coded messages and fucking in ramshackle rooms, and never, ever looking back, because it's one of the best things that has ever happened to both of them.

And still, they are on opposite sides of the war, still enemies, still untrusting of each other because the galaxy can't afford a slip.

'I could kill you in your sleep,' Leia says one day, her head propped up on one arm as she studies him, a hand resting on his chest.

'I know you could.' Han has seen her aim, and has seen her shooting Imperials in cold blood. 'I could take you to Vader.'

'No, you couldn't,' Leia retorts, a small smile playing on her lips. 'You never could, that's why we're here.'

She's so right, and so beautiful, and so much more than an Imperial scoundrel like him deserves. And she never gives up trying to take him with her, away from a thing he no longer knows if he wants.

'Han, we need you.'

The phrasing pisses him off. ' _We_ need?'

'Yes.'

'Well, what about _you_ need?'

Leia looks at him with her big brown eyes, pushing a long strand of hair over her shoulder.

'I need? I don't know what you are talking about.'

He doesn't know, doesn't understand what he wants from her and why, why this urgency for her to admit to something, but it frustrates him. 'You probably don't,' he says, slipping out of the bed.

'And what precisely am I supposed to know?'

He points angrily at her as he snatches his clothes from the floor. 'Come on, you want me to stay because of the way you feel about me.'

'You're imagining things,' Leia says after a moment, turning to ice.

Maybe he is. Maybe she'll just never admit it. Either way, Han knows he could never deliver her to Vader, but this woman… this woman could destroy him. The scary part is, he'd let her.


End file.
